The 24 MacArthur 'Genius Grant' fellows who just got $625,000 to save the world

On Tuesday, the MacArthur Foundation announced the 2015 class of its annual fellowship program for people doing amazing things in the world.

Fellows like the culture-shaping journalist Ta-Nahesi Coates, the avant garde puppeteer Basil Twist, and stem cell biologist Lorenz Studer all recieve a $625,000 grant, which they can use in any way they choose.

"We try to reach people who have shown evidence of exceptional creativity but show the potential for more in the future ... to give individuals the freedom to take some risks, to enable them to do new and exciting things," MacArthur managing director Cecilia A. Conrad told the New York Times.

Patrick Awuah is an education entrepreneur revolutionizing the college experience in Ghana.

MacArthur Foundation

Age: 50

City: Accra, Ghana

After going to college in the US and working at Microsoft for years, the Ghana-born Awuah returned home to set up Ashesi University, a school that provides a progressive model of critical thinking-based education.

Matthew Desmond is a sociologist studying structural poverty.

William Dichtel is a chemist building nanostructures.

MacArthur Foundation

Age: 37

City: Ithaca, New York

The Cornell chemist Dichtel has pioneered covalent organic frameworks, a remarkable polymer that has a surface area "a football field per gram of the polymer" that can be used in a range of research applications.

Michelle Dorrance is a choreographer reinventing tap.

Nicole Eisenman is a painter making figurative art relevant again.

MacArthur Foundation

Age: 50

City: New York, New York

While painting has moved further and further into abstraction, Eisenman has made the depictions of the human body continually compelling, exploring themes like inequality and gender in nearly 40 years of work.

Harvard Medical School neuroscientist Stevens has identified an additional function of microglia, a type of brain cell that she discovered is used to "prune" pathways in the brain — which may relate to conditions ranging from schizophrenia to Alzheimer's.

Alex Truesdell is a designer making tools and furniture more accessible.

Puppeteer Basil Twist has reinvigorated his art form.

MacArthur Foundation

Age: 46

City: New York, New York

Twist has helped restore puppetry — often associated with children — as a form of high art for adults. His works of abstracted puppetry, 2013's "Rite of Spring," have helped place his craft in the context of theatre and dance.